A More Civilized Age: A Star Wars Podcast - 09: Trespass and The Hidden Enemy (Clone Wars 15 & 16)

Episode Date: April 7, 2021

Content warnings: Discussion of sex and drug use. It should've been a simple episode. Two stand alone stories, each filled to the brim with the sort of political world building and philosophical question raising content that we thrive on. And, for what it's worth, we roll right into all of that. But then, perhaps because the tracks had been greased a little too well, perhaps because of hubris, or perhaps because of the ever-present will of the force, we go way off the rails.  And frankly, we were due. Next time: Revenge of the Sith Show Notes Hosted by Rob Zacny (@RobZacny) Featuring Alicia Acampora (@ali_west), Austin Walker (@austin_walker), and Natalie Watson (@nataliewatson) Produced by Austin Walker Music by Jack de Quidt (@notquitereal) Cover art by Xeecee (@xeeceevevo)  

Let us return once more to a more civilized age, a Clone Wars podcast. I'm Rob Zackney, joined by Ali Akampora, Austin Walker, and Natalie Watson. We're about to embark on a pretty decent run of episodes as the show hits what feels like a late season stride and lays the groundwork for a real second season leap. tonight I think we'll see the Jedi at their best as warrior diplomats in the episode trespass and then the focus will shift to the clones themselves in the hidden enemy where we'll see some fractures in the foundation of the republic's war effort thanks as always to those who have supported us on patreon.com slash civilized where once a month we do a Q&A podcast covering

your questions on the episodes we've recently discussed and we might have a few more details about that at the end of the episode as we try to figure out what the rest of this month is going to cover, so bear with us. Some of you will be very happy. Anyway, let's get to these two episodes, starting with trespass. It's a pretty simple plot. The Jedi have arrived at the ice world of Ordo Plutonia to investigate a listening post that's gone silent. They're there at the behest of the militaristic pantorans who live on a nearby moon in the system. They are convinced the ice planet is a dead, uninhabited world, but it turns out to be home to a tribal civilization, the Tal. The Pantorans don't want to hear

that, and their military governor, Chairman Chichot, decides to start a war instead, and in the end, the Jedi have to figure out how they can stop this war in its tracks and get the Pantorans to change course from waging a war of colonial conquest. So that's the... Did you think that you would say that the Jedi had to figure that out? Well I think they did a lot of leading that horse to water Sure I think the Jedi were not there

Those fucking The what is the name of the The Tals? Yes would be dead right 100% There's a specific moment I think in this episode Where they were just kind of standing there

And that was a little rough I don't know The Tals fucked up all those droids and clones This is true. They did win those fights. I just worry that they wouldn't win a follow-up attack from a group of people who has spaceships. I think the moment that I think tells a lot in terms of what they're technological level and like they stop when they see the ships coming in. That's what stops the fight at the towards the end of this episode.

Because they're like, we can't. What are we going to do? Those are spaceships. They beat the shit out of the clums. and wrecked the chairman, which is great. I think they would put up a real fucking fight, but I don't, more importantly, sorry, more importantly, the actual thing is, do we think that the Pantorans would have ever not tried to kill them without Obi-Wan and Anakin being here?

I mean. Because my whole read on the chairman-senator situation was that the senator was deeply intimidated by the chairman to the degree that she would not have. And this is like, Star Wars loves a naive young woman politician who's in over her head. Yeah. Which is ironic since Leia is like explicitly written as a fun inversion of that. You meet her and she is just like a huge ball of energy and violence when you meet her. And she's like, yeah, give me a fucking blaster.

Let's go. But I feel like the prequel movies are filled with, not that I guess, you know, Padma gets there too. but but but she doesn't she seems completely overwhelmed and not particularly ready to use the mechanism she has at at arm's reach to get what she wants i think it's well she seems not really aware of what her options are i mean i think the the the thing that this episode illustrated to me so well is um the the inexcused experience of the people leading this war and you know you have someone like uh senator chucci who seems pretty fresh-faced seems pretty i don't know what the you know voting structure is like on ordo plutonia or like how she was you know put in that role but yet again we're kind have confronted with another military force that is being led by, or we're seeing more and more leaders with just no experience under their belts.

My read on her, or the thing that's interesting about that relationship is if her jurisdiction is the Galactic Republic and the chairman's is Pantora and the system. and it feels almost like they send the young and experienced person off to deal with the Republic and the Senate because they don't give a fuck about it. Leave us alone. Let us do what we want to do. I wish I knew more about Pantora because I don't know what their money situation is or their. I mean, I know they're coded as being powerful and well-dressed and fancy and like- Oh, you mean Ordo-Cutonia? No. Ordo-Putonia is the ice planet. But, yeah, yeah.

Wait. Ordo plutonia is the ice planet. They're from Pantora, which is a moon. Yes, yes. Sorry, I got that mixed up. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, like, I wish we had seen that planet so that we could have seen a little bit more of, like, what their vibe is. But, like...

I mean, they seem pretty sophisticated. Yeah. You have the chairman talking about having, you know, however many decades of military experiencing. I'm guessing that they've been doing... that they're well-versed in colonization. I guess it's hard to say. Or at least military conflict. Like, it seems like the chairman specifically has seen his fair share of battle.

But the thing about Chucci, and I think the reason why she stood out to me is that she is young, has is interested in a different approach. Her instinct is not to follow Chairman Cho. It's more so her obligation. But she wants to be creative. She wants to see alternative. She says something about, yeah, maybe there can be a peaceful resolution

if it's not the separatists. So I think she's evoking the larger youth movement that is at odds with sort of like the institution that they're coming into. We get the generational thing again here, right? Yeah. That's what it feels like to be. I don't love that it's like this forced girl boss moment, but it's like. I see I don't So I think I think she's not

She isn't really quick Do we want to slow down And like Yeah we should And get to that moment More naturally Let's do And like talk through the events

Of this episode Because I think that'll Key us up I love how it opens Because it's got this great Like ice station zebra The Thing vibe Where it's the Jedi

Disembarking At this listening post And everyone's dead Like it's just The entire position Was overrun destroyed and they open the blast doors on the clone base and their helmets are there mounted on stakes in what's pretty clearly a warning to anyone who follows and but right out like right from the

jump like the second they get off their gunships and they run they meet up with um chairman choe like the dynamics in play are really interesting uh because to a degree the jediron charge of this mission but at the same time they're there as guests of the Pantorans. And so it begins with a bit of a pissing contest where Obi-Wan tries to caution the chairman and the Pantorans from like even disembarking. He's kind of like you should probably stay clear until we secured the area. And Chichot immediately, you know, he says, I respect your opinion, but I'm in charge here. And that's kind of the tenor of this entire encounter.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, he says, our moon of Pantor is the only civilization in the system. I'm the one who asks the Senate to protect this planet. This wasteland belongs to us. Just already shitting on the planet that he's colonizing. And Obi-1 response. Yeah, also, it's a miserable ice ball. Like, it is so good that they were like, we could have made a planet that,

is like filled with oil or natural resources and so obviously of that quote unquote a valuable place. I'm like, no, these motherfuckers are willing to kill lots of people over towers of ice, I guess. Like, I guess we know that there will be something here and we know that there are separatists on the planet too. But I deeply like that they didn't ever stop to say, well, if you run the numbers, this would be a really big beneficial. Like, no, like, we don't even get that argument. This person just believes it is his moral, like, right and his people's moral right to take this place. It's just that vanity. And Obi-Wan responds to him and says, with all due respect, Chairman, this is for the Senate to decide, not us.

And I really liked seeing Obi-Wan kind of go head-to-head with him in this moment. But he responds, Jedi report to the Senate, which is Senator Choochee. and Chuchi chichi chimes in and says, technically speaking, chairman is correct. Since the planet is uninhabited, the moon of Pantor reserves the right to continue as its protectorate. I don't think that's how protect. That's not what protectorate means. It would have to be a nation. Like protectors are, yeah.

But I get it, you know. But this is really, this episode has some really interesting, like, nationhood slash yeah uh just like like what how are things being how are places and people being classified under um the galactic senate and it's it's just really fascinating to me we get our first law here a little bit later in right which is the

convention of civilized systems yeah which like that's the first time we've heard of there being a specific bill besides the one that allowed them to get the clone army and so yeah we get this great interlocking of there is a planet the planet has been claimed by a planet in the galactic republic and so that means that that that planet's government pantora's government says this is ours and then on top of that we get a layer of but if there are people on this planet then it becomes a planet that's part of that's potentially part of the Galactic Republic

though I'm just now realizing this not because the people on the planet decided to join the Galactic Republic if there are civilized people there the Galactic Republic just says this is covered by the Convention of Civilized Systems

and it's under our protection now and that means senators make decisions about what happens there? There is an interesting, like, the Republic will decide how that's adjudicated, which is super interesting and, like, kind of inheriting. Let's say there are no clones yet. I know we just, I know we just did a cue an episode with a bunch of what ifs. Let's say there aren't clone troopers yet, right?

And let's say this happens in the, 50 years ago. And it still comes out. There is a native culture here. There are people here already. But Pantora wants it. What happens? Does... Well, that's why they created this thing, right?

Because what the Republic is really delegating is land claim, not like taxes or protection or anything of that. Okay, sorry, actually, here's actually the thing I want to ask. What happens 50 years ago before there was an army if Pantora says, well, we're going to take it anyway? The Republic can't stop them from doing it. I guess they send Jedi. Right. They send Jedi and I think there's like a fucking 10-year-long vote that goes on in the Senate somewhere. That eventually says, yeah, well, they did it anyway.

I mean, even that's what happens in this episode. The episode is dependent on a, upon a diplomacy, is dependent on like somebody okaying a fucking, you know, know, reason to over, the fact that the chairman is, you know what I'm trying to say, unfit, unfit to, yeah, he's, he's overstepped his role. And that was like an unbelievable moment to me in this episode. Just the fact that, I get it. I like seeing that stuff, though, because like the moment that you open that door, I'd rather see what those mechanisms are. And And those are what mechanisms are when it comes to someone who is an elected leader in a given, in any given sovereign nation. Like, the idea of like.

To be clear, I really, I love that moment because it just, it, it showcased the, just the fucking bureaucracy of like you are in the war is happening right now. People are getting shot. But you still need the sign off. But you still need to go hit up the holocron and like, yeah, you got to get the permission. and slip signed. It was, yeah, it was such a moment.

So the way they end discovering this planet's even inhabited is that their assumption initially is that the separatists also have a base on this ice world.

They must have come and raided the clones. They go over and they find the battle droids similarly arranged in sort of a like poses um their corpse just sort of arrayed in within their base uh and so it's clear that someone took them both down but the droids got a recording done of what happened here and

they get a quick glimpse of a big uh furry sloth-like creature just fucking up a droid and you get I don't know if this is the first It has been hinted much at about Obi-Wan But Obi-Wan has a very like 18th century explorer vibe around him at times Where like one, he is very curious about the galaxy Like he is fascinated by new information and like new species, new science But also he's frequently like

that seems useful and he thinks about like how we could use that and so when he sees this video of a big pissed off ice sloth just demolishing a droid he's like cool warrior um and i think it gives us a little taste of like how obi one to a degree you know there is something like he like a person of science there can be something noble about that But often the framework that attends that, it can be a very materialistic framework as well, where it's like, oh, I don't actually just want to learn about the world. I want to see how I can better exploit it. Deeply Enlightenment era double-edged sword here, right? Which is like, let's learn about things.

Let's move past our superstitions and our prejudices and recognize that, like, hey, like, there is sociology to be done here. There is military, you know, a development to be done here. And as you start going down that road, you get towards like, and what if we, we could probably administer this place a little bit better using our scientific methodologies. And that's, in some ways, he's on that same continuum with Cho, even though Cho is all the way to how do we exploit this space. Yeah. Obi-Wan is, how do we exploit this, how do we exploit this in a lowercase e-sense and maybe defend the sovereignty of the people here? But ideally, we also leave with some knowledge, some thing that we didn't have before. He still describes, you know, approaching them as do not provoke them.

Which is, it just comes off deeply like these. But, wait, I don't know. And he was about to draw his fucking sword, dude. You cannot. The way our troops and the droids must have. Like, I don't think he's, his mindset is pretty clear. He's like, clearly these people don't, like, they're letting us approach. I think this is, like, for me, this is kind of like, this is why Jedi are useful.

right because like traditional diplomats might be understandably freaked out to go parlay with the killer slots and so you do need like it helps to have people who are like if it comes down to it we can probably take care of ourselves but that also gives them the like clarity of mind where like obi one's like no we're not there yet we can chill out yeah you need both of them That whole negotiation sequence is them needing both of them needed to be there. Neither of them could have gotten done themselves. Anakin is ready to fight out the gate, reaches for his saber. Then they get inside to, they get, you know, led in to the kind of like interior of one of these, one of their homes by the chief, whose name is, to Thai something, right?

It is. It's, Tysen. Tysen. and Obi-Wan does just straight up say the thing of like what is it

it's like we come in it's basically we come in peace he basically says we come in peace he's also doing the thing where he's just saying it louder yes it's a miserable

we are here in peace for you oh it sucks and and Anakin who's like figured out oh they use like

pictograms that like we can read as well and so Anakin draws a schematic of friendship. And they're like, oh, yeah, okay. You know why Anika drew that? Because he fucking learned it from the Lermens.

He learned how to draw. He's on Lermann. He's like, this is probably what the vibe was on Lerman Planet. They were just drawing to communicate with their friends. We do get also, we shouldn't see past it, the most testy exchange between Obi-Wan and Anakin about this, which does, again, I think,

Anakin looks bad here until the drawing sequence because Anakin says, how do you plan on communicating with these things? And Obi-Wan says, patience, maybe they're smarter than we are. And then the leader puts a spear in the ground. And, oh, and Anakin goes, well, say something. And Obi-Wan says, just shut up. And it's like, who, spicy. Spicy on Ordo plutonia.

Need a little heat. Also, I definitely would have caused a war right at that moment because I'd have been like, oh, we better light off our lightsabers and stick them in the snow in the same way. And, like, instantly, like, and that's how Anakin ends up slaughtering another tiger village. Like, oh, no. Oh, my God. It's worth noting that Tyson gets the title, Son of Sons, which you have the, if you have the subtitles on, it's S-O-N- of S-U-N-S. Which apparently is pulled from an old Star Wars script.

apparently there were drafts throughout previous Star Wars films that referred to a character, a prophesized hero being called the Son of Sons, but it never made it into the movies. And so for years, there were fans that thought that the kind of chosen one prophecy, the Skywalker prophecy, was connected to the Son of Sons prophecy. But then they just drop it here to be like, no, this is it, this is him, this is the Son of Sons, Tysen. Um, so at some point there was also a, the people believed that during the, the, um, Nabu celebration in the movies, people are shouting out the son of sons, but that's not happening. It's not. It's not happening. And, and this is the son of sons. That rules. I'm glad they did that. Yeah. I'm glad there was like a big, you know, open thread and they're like, now we're in close that. It's this motherfucker. He rules. He's the son of sons. Shout us to Taisan

I mean, we'll never know And that's the shame of it But how did he get that name If it's not like A particularly sunny planet I don't remember seeing any suns Well, kings are often Well, in Egyptian

Ancient Egypt The king was meant to be like the son of Ra Right? And Ra is the sun god Egypt had a lot of sun though Egypt did have a lot of sun sunny place Egypt is a lot of like multiple growing seasons yeah but that's what they're doing stuff but but but imagine sun coming to ordo plutonia very valuable stuff sure so if you're a leader and you want to associate yourself to something that's like not everyone's going to get access to

or like isn't coming around that often sun's a good idea like you are literally bringing warmth in It hasn't, it's not here right now But you've got the connect Yeah You've got the connect Yeah you've got the son's phone number Um This is sadly the only

The only Tysen This shit will ever get We never get it anymore I love him He's in Lego Star Wars 3 The Clone Wars Is like the non-canonical Appearance

And I bet someone's modded him into fucking Star Wars Battle front. I hope so. I would love to. An interesting note, an interesting note is that the talls show who show up here. The first time that we see one of them is in, most easily, was easily in New Hope.

I thought I was like, wait, these guys look so familiar from. Yeah, he's one of the, there's one who, yeah, there's one who's in the background at the canteena scene early on in that movie, which means that sometime before now and then they spread out into the world. They don't, this is not the only planet that they're on. Also, also, how does C3Pio know how to speak to them? That's the thing. He knows every language.

But like, the Republic database has a dictionary of them, right? So, like, the main dudes, like, opinions are vile and not worth, like, investigating. But I feel like, I feel like when it's, like, oh, okay, like, your language is recognized. you have to pull back on the like they're literally animals i don't care about this right yes immediately right well so i thought my suspicion has always been so 3PO is your classic universal translator like device narratively but like six million forms of communication i guess i could buy that like there's only so many language archetypes probably you'd run into out there like he can probably start to zero in roughly on like i think i know what's going to

on um that's always they're not from here how'd they get here how wasn't there an episode about how they got here wait they're not from pluto no they're from alzok three they're from a different planet well because obi one is definitely like no they're from this planet because they wouldn't have been able to travel yeah unfortunately obiwan canobi wrong as a mother sure i mean i believe that but very Obi-1-Kanoby 18th Explorer vibes to be like, ah! These people were always here.

They never could have moved from one island to another. No one could have taxied them over here via, you know. Also, though, is that Al-Sac-3 stuff stemming from the fact that, like, every single thing that appears in a background shot of the movie has to be, like, have an origin story to explain why it's there. And so, like... Maybe. I mean, this is still canon.

It's still canon. This is not legends. This is... Is this why you have the Senate and the Republic kind of get into these issues, though? Because the Talas could be like, no, we're from here. This is our planet to worry about it. And then the Republic would do a Google like you have and be like, nah. Y'all are from Al-Zoc 3.

We already downloaded you into our C3Pio. We know you. You've been around. God, I can only imagine how many encarta CDs. and as a kid, just like chowing down on those things. So while this is all going on, by the way, we have a real testy exchange between Choo Chichy and Chichot over at the clone base,

where Cho is like, we got to get ready. The separatists are out there, and they did all this. And Rio Chichie is kind of saying, like, they weren't shot. like it doesn't look like a battle droid attack but we see the sort of way chichot roles is to make these not just appeals to his own authority his own like experience but also to the hypothetical sacrifice he is willing to make he says something as as chuchy is advocating like lowering the temperature and maybe being open to other uh possibilities here he says finally cut it all off

He says, Senator, I'm willing to fight and die for my people. It's time to ask yourself whether you are willing to do the same. And, like, again, when we're talking about when this is all coming out, you know, the United States is, like, taking a sharp turn toward, like, honoring the troops just reflexively, not questioning sacrifice. Real, like, it's real wrapping yourself on the flag hours in the U.S. It has been for years. specific thing that you're saying is that like, or the specific

to build on what you're saying, because I've heard you make similar, we've talked about this topic before, both on and off podcast, but there's almost a moment, there's almost a thing that's happening in the mid 2000s in America, which is it seems, it's undeniable that American troops are dying.

And that death becomes justification because it is, it is like, you know, a alchemically transformed into sacrifice, exactly, whatever the mission is. Once you have it coated in blood,

you're allowed to say, you're able to say, well, you can't say what they were doing or bad because they died, and they did it for you. Even if like, no,

actually, their death did not better me in any fucking way. I would not have, we would have not have wanted to send them to go die in this way. They could have served us much better doing anything else,

not anything else, but many other things. I mean, I think this exchange speaks to that so much because she's not, like, it comes out of such,

like such left field his response to her being like we should consider like peaceful resolutions and like maybe it doesn't seem like they're their separatists so this could be like somebody living here and he's like I'm ready to die right now

because I'm because if you're not I'm ready right now so you should step up your game and it just feels like so she she's like um okay like what are you talking about And also, this actually does pick up a thread that was sort of left angling from the last episode.

This is why where the Lerman Headman says, it's not about what are you willing to die for, but what are you willing to kill for? Which, he says a lot of bullshit in that episode, but this is one of the more material points, where it's like, it's not about whether you're willing to make a sacrifice. A lot of time people are saying, I'm willing to make a sacrifice while advocating violence and, like, being allowed to exercise that violence. But here we see Cheecho the way that argument is often deployed, which is I signed up to potentially take on these risks and make these sacrifices. You did not. You signed up to be a senator, ostensibly a safer occupation, though we're both here in the shit, possibly about to get a separatist shot between the eyes. But nevertheless, he's got this like moral authority, he thinks, because he volunteered to maybe get killed. But in the meantime, he also gets all the power and privilege.

He is a general in command of this army. And so it's just a really, like, illuminating way he sort of deploys that, this notion of sacrifice that is hypothetical that he has not made to shut down any opposition to him using the power that he obviously covets and wields with impunity. Yeah. He also just, he also just, and it should be sent for the, people who are listening to us without watching the episodes, like does lay out the most manifest destiny, uh, white supremacist argument against the, the talls that, that he could.

Uh, he says, and I'm, I'm combining a few little things here across a single scene. He says, whoever they are, they belong to us. The whole system belongs to us. They are savages. Look at what they've done. They've slaughtered your troops. These creatures are little more than animals. You can't lie to an animal. They can't be trusted. No, it's. obvious these creatures are not covered by the Convention of Civilized Systems. The Jedi Council has no say in the matter. I was, I was pretty, I guess I wasn't surprised I've seen this episode before, but actually it was. In my memory, this episode was way more like of a seesaw going back and forth, and it was way more, there were beats that I thought would happen in this

episode that didn't happen. There's a version of this episode that I think it's made, you know, 10 years prior, let's say, or by a different creative team today, in which what ends up happening is the Tals and the clone troopers are about to fight each other and the separatists show up and they realize, oh, we have a shared enemy. And this episode does not do that. It does not like, it lets the conflict happen and play out with death on both sides with our clones are, meaning, you know, the viewers associated clone troopers taking orders from a virulent racist and imperialist killing the talls after they've been established to be a peaceful and sovereign people and then still needed to get on the ship and ride off into the sunset at the end and like

fucking sit with that you know like this there were moments early on in this episode where I found myself going like why would Rex listen to what Cho says and the clones all listen to what Cho says they do they do listen to what he says it's wild I love that they committed to it. Yes. I love that they did this, but that's what frustrated me so much about Obi-Wan and Anakin taking a backseat to Chucci in that moment where he's like, those are your men out there. I was like, those are your men too, dude. What are you talking about? like he he says to her those are your men like you need to you need to uh to to to go in parley with the the uh talls which i i agree with the fact that her as a representative of the place that just tried to colonize this planet needs to have a role here and needs to like make a show of good faith and like needs to basically apologize I guess um but at the same time I was

like you you guys aren't clean from this like Anakin and and Obi-Wan yeah you tried to like strike peace with them you're communicating stuff like that but those are still your men out there like slaughtering the towels so I didn't I didn't read any of that to be and this is just 100% is me potentially missing those lines about it being about Hermann dying. My read on that was so much about this is, our jurisdiction means we cannot make a peace treaty between two planets inside of the Republic. That is not what we're here. We can't do that.

We can mediate that conversation. We can set that conversation up. We do not have the authority, says Obi-Wan, to go to them and say, well, now you and Pantora are at peace. We're not representatives of Pantora. We're representatives of the federal government. The federal government can't make peace between two independent, you know, nations underneath it. Otherwise, they would have just done that when they first met the dude, you know, met Tysan in the, in, in his house, right?

But they couldn't do that. Hmm? They couldn't do that because, because, uh, Cho needed to, they had, I mean, Cho would have. Cho would have instigated something at a later point. But they didn't have the authority to make that decision in that initial negotiation then, and they still don't have it. They need someone from Pantora. Yes, I understand that.

It's not so much that I wanted them to be like an active agent in that. It just felt like kind of like, this is on you. Like there's nothing for us to do here, which maybe that's true. But there was something about the tone in the way that Obi-Wan delivered that. that just felt like he, he didn't have, like, he didn't owe anything to the situation, even though his direct reports are out there killing these people. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, but he does take direct action once, and he tells Rex, keep this fucking guy alive.

And I think this is, this is the thing is, like, I think informing this entire episode is that the republic is a declining order and they just need to keep these fucking pantorans on side like they clearly have a military they are maybe reasonably strategically located but like either way the republic has the shitty ally that has laid claim to this entire system

and first and foremost Obi-Wan and Anakin are terrified of rocking that boat and so I think this is like more than the normal would be they're like we have to work through channels and make it so that however this shakes out the pantorians are comfortable with like the way this all unfolded and it's all like legally locked up because i think if they're just like show each shit now we got a problem and now it's like now the pantorans might be like we want nothing to do the republic and so like this kind of does capture the way that like the sort of declining empires and that's kind of what the

Republic is, or at least a declining hegemony, end up in these conflicts on the wrong side with the wrong people because they're so dependent now on outside powers for their own legitimacy and position that they end up having the backplays that make zero sense, which is why you end up with Cho being like, I'm going to go just like, I'm going to go charge of the life brigade these, these, uh, these towel. all obiwan can do is like you've got to go with him and make sure he stays alive just keep that guy alive long enough for us to sort this out um and it sucks like he like he clearly obi won wants to tell cho to eat shit he's told him that in so many words a few times in this episode

but he until he knows that the pentorans are going to shut this guy down um you can't really do anything, which is why you end up with this weird, like, and I think this is where it being a children show gets frustrating. The senator is there to represent the way kids have to learn after a certain point that, like, adults don't always, like, some adults are full of shit. Some adults are bad. People in authority will tell you bad things that you're not comfortable with, and you should trust that instinct and, like, act on it. And so the other thing that is happening here is a morality play for children where Obi-Wan and Anakin, mostly Obi-Wan, has to be like, gee, if only somebody had the power to say no to this guy,

maybe we should think about what we're allowed to do as individuals. Maybe we should see if there's some other authority figure we can talk to about how we feel, about how this is all going. And Choo Chie, voiced by Jennifer Hale, playing a very good, like, ingenue, like a little kid senator, is like, gee, could I, it's, like, Elmo could read this line. Like, it's totally like, you mean me? I could call the assembly. It's like, yes, you, Choochee, you could call the assembly and tell him about what, what Chow was doing. And do you think that would work? I think so.

I think it's a good idea. Why don't you look at the phone number written on the tag of your dress and just call it and let the assembly know what's going on? It's really a frustrating intention in this episode because I'm glad that we're doing these two episodes together because it's really easy to see how like the actions of one leads to the attitude of the other. because like the idea of Anakin just being like, oh, your assignment is to stay with this guy and listen to whatever he says, even though everybody else in this robe knows that he's being unreasonable. And then like even it's the scene that really stands out to me is in a clone trooper ship with a bunch of other clones in the background where Obi-Wad is like, okay, Choochee,

like what are you going to say? What do you get out there? And she's immediately like, oh, well, I thought that you. would handle this for me and obiwan has to immediately be like no you to go do this this delegation on your own and like the the like the it there's a million things happening on once there with like her trying to lead on obiwan in this way like other soldiers being there and just being like what is what are we fighting for what did yeah what the dynamics here um is is very telling i mean it's can you met go ahead the clones cany

Even, Rob, you pointed out earlier that Obi-1 tells the clones, keep this guy alive. Even the clones tell Cho, listen, we're just here to keep you alive, but that still doesn't stop them from having to shoot across the line. Like, there's still, it doesn't change anything. Like, you still have to fall in line. You still have to do the job. and that's the thing this episode is immensely

frustrating but for like a really for good reasons because it just shows like the fucking just what you said earlier Rob just how broken this republic is it just how who the fuck is it serving like

and here's what's fucked I think this episode also gives us a look at what this system working is supposed to look like that's the horrifying thing is all of this where the Jedi show up, they are first through the door diplomats

making first contact. They have expertise that the other people don't have that would allow them to do that first contact. They are negotiators between internal factions of this other power. They are combat commanders

if needed in a tense and like fluid situation. And the best that they can do, the thing they can't do is rule. And this is where the Republic's legitimacy kind of like crumbles, like the moral legitimacy. It is so clear what is happening here. But they have

to, and they are obligated, to try and work it, so that the Pantorans are comfortable with the outcome. Not that the TAL are taken care of, but that the Pantorans feel that it was settled fairly. And if the assembly have been like

fuck it, that system's ours, would Anakin and Obi-Wan have done anything? Like, they get let off the hook. But Do they go home, Matt? Do they go home and say, like, I mean, I almost do wish we'd gotten a little bit more Anakin in this episode being the voice of the like, why can't we just kill this show, dude?

Why can't we just beat the shit out of show, lock him up, let the senator finish the negotiations and deal with it from here. And I, you know, we know, I think in our heart of hearts, we know that's where he was at probably, maybe not. I think after he does pictures, after he does pictographs with them, or pictograms with Even just like the embarrassment alone of being like, okay, we're going to be back here in like two hours. You're going to talk to this guy. It's going to be chill.

And then they all come back there together. And it's this conversation that's like the like he is at a hundred to begin with. And it's just like, I'm not negotiating it at all. And then like, Obi-1 is even there to be like, hey. And it's embarrassing more than it is. Well, it's awful. But it's also very embarrassing. No, but it's, yeah, it is amazing.

they're able to put the genie back in the bottle by the end of this thing because like the Jedi have been completely exposed as like if they're not bad faith negotiators their word is not binding um like they set up this they set up this negotiation where the guy just hurls abuse at the towel and the towel are like if that's how it's going to be it's going to be war and he's like fuck yeah it is and the Jedi are just like well I guess you know I guess we're riding shotgun on this I do want to call out, too. It's a great battle sequence.

Oh, my God. It's total shades of John Ford's, like, Fort Apache. The cavalry charge gone horribly wrong. They get completely ambushed in this canyon and picked apart. You know, the clones, like, try to circle up and just try to ride out the storm. And mercifully, a spear hits Cho. And they just throw them on the back of a bike and get out of there. Finally, we can get the fuck out of your...

but like everyone's dead like a bunch of clones are dead ton of Cho's men are gone a lot of Tao I've just been like massacred trying to assault this this little this breastwork

um towel are good at this by the way they're yeah 100% like they just break that line the thing that stood out to me is this the first time that we've seen a planet with like a with their own private security

because Cho is is walking around with those two guards who like do some shit in that fight like they lose pretty early but when they're on it they do pretty well um is it the first time it might be who at rodea didn't have shit no what about the pirates maybe they didn't i don't remember pie yeah the pirates but they're not a they don't seem like i don't know yeah i guess if they're the only people on that planet that's that's their planet but yeah in terms of galactic republic member states oh the The Nibu have guards. Oh, sure, sure.

So, Nibir, right? That's one. It stands out to me because he's such a military character, but, like, also wasn't able to, like, identify just the most normal war stuff in that first scene. Yeah. But it's, like, what's the experience is here? Zero observational skills. Yeah.

Just wants to kill people. Like. Doesn't care, right? He just truly doesn't give a fuck. That's actually probably the thing is that he doesn't give a fuck. He just wants the planet. Like, it. It doesn't matter what happened here, who caused it.

All he cares about is securing the planet for himself. I bet part of that is like you think about it, they're from a moon of this planet. They've looked up every night at the sky and seen this planet there. And for generations, I've been like, well, that's ours. That's our moon. Or that's our planet. We rotate around that. That's also ours.

And they get there and they're like, what do you mean our people got killed here? It's ours. It would be like if we like dead. astronauts on the moon. We're like, well, we've got to go back them out. That's our fucking moon. It isn't there people. No, not necessarily.

Obi-Wan and Anakin are specifically there, and the narrator says this. They're there to investigate the clones have been dying there. Yes. Right, right, right, right. That's right, right, right. I meant, I meant the clones that are. Sure. But why were the clones there to begin with?

Exactly. Because the, the, no, because. Okay, the Pantorans. Yeah. Yeah. Is that it? Yeah. The Pantorans said, can you send some clones to this planet for us?

Here's my read on the Pantorans. the Pantorians like system sovereignty is probably pretty important in this world like when you think about the Senate yeah races are represented but it seems more like systems are the ones that get a vote like if you control a system you're a star you are a geographic region and like so solo control over a system like you see how breaks down in Nabu Jar Jar gets understudy status when it comes to representing Nabu and so I think like to a degree the Cantorians are reacting rationally to a Republican order that's like we care about systems because that's what shows up on the map. That's what our maps are driven by is who's on what system. And the minute it turns into, oh, this whole system is one we share and we can't just like do whatever we want with it. That changes your conception of your place pretty radically, you know, in one stroke. do you think they get more votes or more do they get something if they get to say we control the system including this big ice planet we can now file for ice planet stimulus package because we control an ice planet like i'm being dead ass serious in terms of like there probably are incentives for well we we manage not just our home our home moon but actually a number of worlds in our system which means we need more

clone troopers, it means we need better access to mining technology or at least some subsidies. It's got to be like highways, right? Like it's got to be if anybody has to travel through that system. Yeah. You got to pay taxes to us. They're paying the toll. Something like that.

So it's like fucking Caton. Like the more roads you can get, you're hitting more points. And also it could change is like, so imagine like also like five, ten years from now the towel are like, hey, This galaxy out there is full of cool people. And we've invited, you know, the Salonians to show up and, like, start doing some, you know, they wanted to run, like, an outpost here.

Fuck it. Yeah, we're down with them. And so suddenly, like, now the planet you orbit, other people are going to start hanging out there because, hey, the natives invited us. And you're up there being like, this feels invasive. psychologically it would You don't really have a right to complain But I think this is kind of the thing That the Pantorans are

A little bit I mean they're a little bit paranoid about it This is why they wanted their Republic there with troops in the first place Was like they want their position defended Which is as this like Regional power It's worth noting

We already talked about how good that battle scene is I think the costume design In this episode is extremely strong The Pantorans are is the first time that they show up in Star Wars and they're such a distinctive culture visually obviously drawing from

colonial era like military uniforms and dress also they have South African accents or at least I think I think Chichie does and I know that like they voice actors were told to try to bring out a South African thing

so you know kind of a Dutch colonial vibe obviously obviously this is episode of Colonial They did not, thankfully, did not retreat away from certain signifiers in that way. Just load it up. Yeah, exactly. Just dump it all in here.

Why not? And also just, like, I think that the speeders in this episode look sick as hell. Yeah. Those things are called Freco Bikes, F-R-E-E-C-O, the Freakos. They have, like, the big, also, yeah, Freikos, that's right. They have big, like, bulb glass cockpits. They're, like, a little, they're, like, they almost, like, overhang the side, like, of the, of the side bottom of the bike that's it's sick.

A note here, 3Pio drives his own speeder. See, 3Pio drives his own speeder because they're one person speeder bikes. I think this might be the first time we've ever seen him driving anything. Though, in the original script to the first Star Wars film,

he did once make reference to piloting speeders as being one of his 30 secondary functions. Well, there are. On top of being a protocol droid. Shout out to you. That's impressive. Shout out to him. While we're talking aesthetics, the clone trooper snow uniform.

Yes. Fucking rules. Yes. It just like keeps going down. Like is it just fabric on the whole part and then like another helmet? Also, the Jedi vests with the Jedi Council symbol on it are real good. Like I want one of those jackets. Totally.

Why, I'd be like, hey, Jedi Council, deploy me, what ice worlds are popping off right now? I want to go. Yeah, I'm going to go requisition one of the puffer vests and go out there and get it done. So, yeah, so they end up, like, as this all melts down and the towel are about to wipe out these, this forks, they're literally like back against the wall on this cliff. Choo-Chi places the call and the assembly is like hey this dude's out of pocket this is not like

we didn't know there were people there we got to shut this down again deeply optimistic that that is what would happen right but hey this is thankfully it does yeah well and also like you know

the Jedi have seen what's happening here so to a degree like if you back if you back Chos play it's not going to the report is not going to reflect great right sure on pentora

it's another great moment of the show of people just saying shit though right like um chuchy coming up and being like I'm willing to live for my people like what does that even mean what is the fuck does that mean

the full line yeah the full line I hate it because also it reminded me so much of the end of the Rodea episode where the person who's mostly at fault for this situation imparts a moral lesson to the person who's been like pretty egregiously wronged in this whole affair and so she's like you know it's about living for your people that's the true sacrifice don't you agree to die for one's people is a great sacrifice to live

for one's people and even greater sacrifice are you ready to live with me which is a it's supposed yeah are you ready to live with me damn okay it's a rejoinder obviously to his earlier things about like I'm ready to die and that gives me a great deal of moral authority here and she's now saying well no my moral authority is greater because I'm going to live through the complexities of needing to share the system with these people we don't have spaceships yet um being like the tall wasn't there when that happens he doesn't know that lead it that poor big swath you need to understand son of sons I'm referencing a thing that happened about 13 hours ago.

The guy, he was a real dick, and he did a whole thing about the sacrifice. Don't worry, it's a really good own on him. I just owned him. He's getting owned right now. He'd die mad, Cho. It just feels like, like an almost offensive thing to say to somebody who was just in a battle

and, like, lost a bunch of troops. Who would have died for his people if it had gone any differently? Yeah. And it's like, are you prepared to de-escalate this? Yes, he was. He tried. In fact, he didn't want to escalate it to begin with. It's so ridiculous.

It sucks. But I do like even the death of Cho is well-handled where he's, he is a sort of pathetic figure at the end where he's begging, like, please avenge me. And she's like, nah, like your day is done. And he dies, like, realizing his mission is a failure. his life's work is a failure and the final shot of the episode is his helmet just billowing on that spear

in the breeze as the ships lift off and prepare to depart to the planet that is the only good thing about that line is that like she I know we already joked about it but like her big thing and again inside of the context it doesn't work but the thing of like setting up

what sounds like at first it's going to be like is she for real going to like clap for this dude who was a complete asshole like imperialist colonizer and then turning it on him and be like but actually he sucks because the thing he could have done was live and that would have been better that part of it I'm fine with but you're right you can't just you can't say that to the people you were just trying to beat the shit out of and expect it to be well received yeah I would have picked that sphere right back up I had a few more things short ones one we get another original trilogy reference oh what was it Anakin says

Most impressive about Choochee, which is a Darth Vader quote. Okay, sure. People say that, though. People just say that. No, this is, it's a, this was in the S&ES Super Star Wars game. They put that, that fucking, like that, it's one of the, like, it's, it's, it's in the, you pull the thing on Darth Vader's back. It's one of those names, do you know, or one of those sayings. Like, this is a, it is a, it is a, Darth Vader saying most impressive, it was a meme, you know, before we knew what me, before we used the word meme.

It was a Star Wars meme. There would have been big JPEGs when Empire Strikes Back came out with goofy images and then Darth Vader saying Most Impressive. The other thing is a staff shoutout. And I think we didn't mention with the aesthetics of this episode, which is the snow. There was someone on the team who did a lot of work previously with I-L-M named Joel Aaron, A-R-O-N, who took the lead on making all of the snow stuff. I wanted to call that out earlier because I thought the snow tech was just so fucking cool.

I mean, this is one of my favorite episodes visually that we've had so far. That stuff is fantastic. And it changes thematically throughout the episode, right? Like the height of the battle, it's a blizzard. When she steps out and starts giving her speech, it slows to a flurry. And that's all, like, someone had to figure that out. And that's like one of the coolest things about this show being a CG show is the idea of someone being given a rundown of an episode is and being told, all right, can you figure out how snow works? Can you do snow

a bunch of different ways, directions and speeds and sizes? And so that rules. And the last thing is a Lucas story. George Lucas knew about this episode, obviously, and was like, I have a very particular idea for what this should look like. And so he took photos of the source says the badlands, which I presume to mean the South Dakota badlands, and then just photocopied them in in like harsh white and black high contrast so that it would just be very stark and then gave them to the team and then in the same interview with feloni philoni then just immediately pivots to say um we really do a lot from ralph mccary's original hoth concept art which uses lots of blues and like a second ago you were saying that lucas wanted this to basically be a

black and white episode and now you're like immediately like throwing that in the trash and you went to the original half source. Yeah, Philoni's like, nah. Thanks for the hand. Thanks for the encyclopedia copies, Luke or Lucas.

Just imagine you're sitting there. You're trying to make your episode and like your fax machine starts to go burr. And like, like faxed, faxes of photocopies of photos he took begins to scroll through. It's like, what the fuck am I looking at? Printed his YouTube videos.

Yeah, 100%. Um, uh, so yeah. And if you look at that, if you look at the original Hoth concept art, there's way more interesting ice shapes. Hoth in that movie is just like snow. And sometimes there's like a little cavern or something where there's a wampa or whatever, but like it's mostly snow. Whereas this place has a lot of cool, weird ice structures. I loved that crystal tower looking structure that was just like that icy blue jutting out into the sky.

That was just like, I've been there with Sid. From Final Fantasy 14. Oh, yeah, great. There's a raid in there, right? There's a rate. I've been doing it a lot lately, actually. Is that the where you go in the dog? Oh, is that, you're talking about Praetorium?

No, no. Yeah, Crystal Tower has dog. Yeah, it has the dog. It has the Joker. It does have the Joker. It has a couple. It has a maze. It's got a lot of different things for everyone.

Yeah, a little bit of it. If you want to go inside of a Cerberus's stomach, you should play Final Fantasy 14. Which is now free up until. Storm Blood. The Joker, Joker? Well, who could say? You have to play to find out what happened. I've been sick Final Fantasy Joker memes.

I've been missing out of them. There are like seven different dudes who are the Joker in Final Fantasy 14. The thing about Final Fantasy 14 is it turns you into the Joker. That's the Yoshi P's trick. Last two quick things. One, this is the director who did the second two malevolence episodes. We'll continue to do good episodes. I'm happy that that's Brian Kaelin O'Connell.

Great episode, you know, here and those past two I liked a lot. There were three writers. I didn't go deep on the writers. I already looked at them all, but I didn't everything special to say. The last thing is... The top writers credit's usually the important one. It's always Gilroy, who's running that room in this first season. That's what it seems like, yeah.

The final thing is it ends with a modified version of the track, The Battle of Christophis, that has been... slowed down and made a little bit more solemn in its recomposition, which is interesting given where we're going. All right, so our next episode, following that music cue, our next episode is perhaps even more interesting and to the point of the Clone Wars as a show, the hidden enemy takes us back to Christophis, the planet that was the scene of the street fighting in the Clone Wars animated film.

the combat has resumed and it almost seems like maybe this episode would have set up the action we saw in that movie That is true This is literally a prequel They did not go back to Christophis This is a prequel to the film

Quote It serves as a prequel to the Clone Wars movie And chronologically takes place Between season two episodes That we're not at yet Cat and Mouse and the film And then in the In the Star Wars.com

breakdown of the episode One of their trivia things is, this episode is indeed a prequel to the Clone Wars movie. As is as the series progresses, it will become evident that some of the stories are more in the format of an anthology jumping around the timeline. This is especially true of the second season of Clone Wars episodes. But I think it really works as a follow-up to that last one for the reasons that you set up earlier, Allie. Natalie, you were saying something while Rob was giving the intro, though, too. Oh, well, one thing is that how, if I were. was a child, how would I be able to fucking keep track of, of the show's chronicle timeline?

I don't think it matters. The war is happening. I don't think it's important to know that this happened before the Clone Wars film. No, and I also, like, I didn't know for sure. I just assumed that they'd read Condit so that, like, this fighting is continued. They're back to Christophis. Because, hey, guess what? They may as well have. This war's not going well. You think Christophis has seen his last brutal street fighting? Probably not. Obviously there will be big

series swinging events But like what episode of what episode of SVU Comes after what other episode of SVU Right But this has lore SVU doesn't have lore I don't have lore It just happens in season finale's when people get written off the show

Which is what's going to happen here It doesn't Also I would say the lore Well, we'll get to it. So the episode opens on a Republic ambush going horribly wrong and the realization that someone betrayed them. They were all posted up, ready to just waylay a bunch of advancing separatist droids. The separatists don't walk into the ambush.

And the next thing that happens is they are bursting through the door of Obi-Wan's command post. And so they have to make a, it turns into a really harrowing escape, shades of, Tet offensive as the clone troopers and the Jedi are literally hauled off the roof of their building by a gun chip as the troops as the droids swarm around. There's so many droids.

There's a lot. This might be the first time the numerical advantage felt real. Yeah. For the droids. Like because they didn't just hold them off. They had to fall back. They were not in control of the situation. But it also causes them to realize

that someone must have sold them out. They decapitate the little tactical droid. The biggest asshole of the droids, in my opinion. That's the one that said, same type of the one that said, I don't care if the droids die, right, during the Jedi crash. Yeah, just total dirtbag droid. But it basically reveals... It rips his head off, rips the head right off the body.

Incredible. Yeah, that is... And they're going to talk to the head, and the head is going to reveal that it knew all their information at advance, when they realized, well, shit, somebody leaked that information. Obi-Wan and Anakin, for reasons, I don't totally follow, but maybe you can explain as we go through the episode. They decide they're going to try to get to the bottom of this by scouting separatist lines

and heading over to see if they can learn something to separatist HQ. They leave Rex and Cody to investigate the possibility that there is a traitor within the republic camp and unfortunately no surer of anakin and uh obi one left then then rex and cody realize somebody left an open mic on the meeting and the entire secret meeting about ferreting out this traitor was being sent was was being sent into somebody's phone and as they try to figure out where who this traitor is um they realize there's just a bunch of fucking clones or around here. So they begin an investigation, interrogating their

fellow clones. It all goes bad. The traitor is revealed, but still devastates the Republic's forces, and the separatists arrive in force to try and conquer the planet. But most troubling of all is the fact that the traitorous clone seems to feel he wasn't committing treason so much

as he was trying to gain his freedom from his Jedi enslavers. Which takes this episode, this series, in a sharply different and exciting direction. I think it's interesting that you said this was a good episode because I did not feel that way until like the last five minutes of it.

But I did not like this episode. I thought it was really boring. I just like didn't, I don't know. It just felt so like. You remember this is the episode with all of the like, like Asage Ventress Obi-Wan. That was good. That was good. Also, the Cody Rex team-up moments.

Like, I'm so glad that they had time to hang out together. I'm, I'm, I'm, I haven't really, they haven't really captured my heart yet. The hate, nothing. It's not hate. It's just, I'm not, they don't, I'm not engaged with them yet. I still am warming up to them as characters. I just, I don't really know them yet. But I, I, I, there was a point that I started to get bought in, but I, I definitely was, felt like,

the opening was pretty weak for me. I don't know. The thing that ends up, the thing, the thing that, the two things that make me like, okay, I'm in. One is, it's the first time we see the Republic do the thing that we've been complaining in the Republic, we won't do, which is take a droid and get information from it. Ever since Grievous tried to steal R2, you're like, why the fuck, there's droids everywhere. I'm like, okay, they do, they do, do it. They do do it.

Two is, is, I love the, the basic premises that. like this thing is falling apart from the inside just like the republic is right the clone the clone army is not um is susceptible to the same sort of interior rot that the republic writ large is and the second that i know that's the direction an episode is going i'm going to be a little bit bought in because i'm curious how they're how it's going to play out um i think i knew pretty much immediately that it was going to be the leader who was named slick oh my god and who was trying to not have seen heat although

yeah exactly although when when uh obiwan and anikin are like trying to figure out who it could have been they're like it would have had to have been someone cunning and resourceful and sexy enough to figure out

like it just felt like they were like it has to be someone so amazing and incredible that would have figured out our plans like only someone's super hot and awesome would have figured this one out. Like, it just, I thought they were just talking. And they were right. Asage Ventress and slick.

Two hot people. I would say this plot seems juicy. Yes. Who are the juiciest separatist generals? Do you think that this plot seems a little thick? Oh my God, it killed me. I just was, I, I mean, in my head, I wasn't, I wasn't imagining a villain. In my head, I was imagining Palpatine, but I was grateful, I was grateful for the

Assange reveal. Do you think for Obi-Wad it was like a thing of like, because when you're a Jedi, you can like sense when people are around you, he was like, my main person is on this planet. I'm getting the horny. I'm getting horny energies. They're clouding my vision. Need post nut clarity immediately. Oh, God.

So I think the thing that I think the opening battle sequence is cool, yeah, the way they get overwhelmed. But I do like... You mean Rob and Natalie have different aesthetic appreciation angles for battle scenes? Who could have guessed? But I liken the Council of War as they're trying to figure out like, well, what happened here? It's clear that like we did get betrayed. Oh, yeah. But there's this horror of like, there's no one here but Jedi and Clemm.

And so that's the real, like, this isn't supposed to happen. This isn't like the clones are not individualized in the way that, for instance, the traitorous senatorial guard is, where it's like that person is clearly, like, they live in a society where, like, they might have their own motivations of greed, individual interest. The clones theoretically aren't supposed to have those things. They're trained to be obedient. And the funny thing is, Rex and Cody are horrified by the thought.

because it's central of their identities. They are their leaders of the clones. And worse, they are all kin. And they regard each other not as comrades, but as family. And so I like that to a degree, Obi-Wan and Anakin being like, yeah, we're going to go do the Jedi shit. We're going to investigate the separatist base

and check things out over there. For some reason, I've looked into it. I don't know why he thinks. He just knows his baddies across the enemy line. He needs to go say whatever. that's his piece right there Cody and Rex you got a DM in his finsta

and Cody and Rocks kind of don't want to but their hand is forced by the fact that somebody put a fucking open mic into the middle of this meeting and there's the quick chase through the base and they follow them to the mess hall and it's like oh shit this is where

this is where I got bought in yeah okay even that that moment the thing that's so good about it is they know before that it's a Jedi or a clone and yet they still get into that room and like fuck it is all it's all clones i think they really hoped beyond hope that they would get there and the thing that they the person that they's all running would turn out to be someone in a disguise and not be a clone but to get that realization like nope it's one of us is is very fun yeah and

the fact that entering the mess hall like them saying the only people in here are brothers like them having to confront the fact that they are more or less identical to each other. And they really can't distinguish themselves from each other. That really fucked me up. I was like, man, individuality is the whole thing, right? Well, and just, I think the other thing lurking in the background here is that what you're talking about here is, so the theme of this episode is fall of innocence.

and what you're talking about here is like one of us has sinned one of us has committed a moral transgression something that we are supposedly bred not to commit if one of us fell maybe any of us could fall it must be very reassuring to be rexed to just think you're always brave you're always courageous you're always honorable you're always there for your brothers you're always there obeying your your Jedi commanders must be very alarming to realize like oh, I could just, I could go bad. The guy to my left or my right could go bad. And so like that's the other thing that's haunting them is like the realization that someone deviated

introduces this whole raft of complications to their own relationship to self. That's really interesting when you compare that to the way that this episode ends and how they confront Slick, how they like nail him. Basically. Well, we actually get, we get two versions of, like, clone deviation, right? Because before they get to slick, during the interrogation, they first think it's Chopper. Yes. Who went missing briefly.

And the reveal is he went missing because he was stealing droid fingers to make into a necklace. Which is illegal, apparently. Yeah. Which is illegal, and which they call, what do they call him? And they call him, Deficient behavior. This is deficient behavior. Deficient behavior.

And Filoni about that, by the way, says, you think Chopper is the guy who's the traitor, but you find out he's been stealing battle droid fingers. You know, that's a bizarre thing. It's to try to hook up with the idea of soldiers cutting off ears or fingers and keeping some sort of memento. His wiring isn't quite right either, like, quote unquote, like Slicks,

which will get to what Filoni's quote is with Slick in a minute. The clones aren't so regimented and cookie cutter as you might think. Even though Chopper doesn't do anything wrong, he breaks a rule. I think by it doesn't do anything wrong, he means he's not the traitor. He's out there pulling droid fingers off and making a little necklace. If I were Obi-Wan and Anakin, I'd loop back around and ask that guy a couple more question because that's, that's a little weird. Faloni's like, this guy, he's a little fucked up he's a little fucked up he thinks this is he thinks this is normal it's like the fucking it's very funny it's like the fucking scene from the joker where obiwan's like you think

this is funny and he's like yeah this is funny i'm taking joyd fingers it's funny it's classic um the fallony quote about slick if we want to hear that now i would yes i like to refer to it as they've gone Django, as in Django Fet. They have a little too much Django Fet in them. They kind of revert to his, yeah, I'll do that for money kind of ways. It's one of the things I think is an issue in the Clone Wars. How can Jedi Knights use these people as a military, knowing they've basically been bred for combat? And this isn't sit well with Slick.

He doesn't see it evidently as being an honorable soldier as Rex does. I mean, Rex is the good soldier, Rex and Cody. They're very loyal, very honorable. They have all the qualities that I think a hero has. And yet Slick sees them more as, you know, cannon fodder. The opening of that quote Had me scratching my fucking head The idea that like

The Django like dial was too high up And that he would be doing this for money Like he makes it pretty clear It's so clear it's not for money Not about the money at all And it's not even He doesn't talk about getting a check at all Like there's no

That's not... He does say there is money He does when push down he's like Yeah I'm getting paid Oh yes you're right But that's only because they're like Oh I bet you got a big check off of this And he's like no

I'm doing this for something bigger than that. Something you haven't even considered. Yes. You're right. It's great. Well, and so before, but Chopper's not the first guy they suspect. The first guy they suspect is the guy who always cleans his weapon after a mission. It means an extended masturbation joke.

But one of the things in- What? Oh, yeah, dude. Yeah, okay. Doubled a doubly so because of all the pin-ups all over their fucking place. including of a Nibu handmaiden, by the way. The orange one? Yeah, uh-huh.

I got, I got screenshots. Don't worry. I'm on it. Because I saw that they were there from like every angle, but I didn't really look. I didn't. I don't understand. They move, right? Because like, sometimes they're behind Rex and Cody, and then they would move and be to the

side so they could stay in frame, which I think supports Rob's whole thing. Yeah, so it's like, oh yeah, I was. It was embarrassing. I was, I was cleaning my weapon. Did you use the computer while you were cleaning your weapon? No, I, you know, it's just, it's something I do. Yeah, he does, after every mission. It's weird.

He always cleans his weapon. And then they're like, let me inspect, let me see your weapon. So he hands the rifle on those phallic, and they're phallic fucking guns. He hands it in those foulest possible way. The guy looks at it, hefts the girth, and is like freshly scrubbed. And somebody says, the rags over the, there in the court. Oh, my God.

But it's not just a horny joke. It is also calling attention to the fact that these clones, like, they are, like, they're that grown, they've been rushed into service. And so it's sort of hints of this like, yeah, they are beings with sexuality that isn't given any sort of space or privacy to express itself or discover itself. and he has to own being this like it's all metaphorical but he has to own being the sexual being in the context of just a brutal invasive interrogation by his COs in front of all his friends it's like if you take it as okay this is about like

if you take it as this is about masturbation it's a horrifying scene because it is so invasive and like highlights how kind of dehumanize their position is and how like everyone's just like no of course we have the right to ask you these questions of course like we can get in your face about this and demand proof I've gone back to watch the scene

and there are it is literally every shot there's a twilight behind somebody else it's nonstop the pinups are everywhere yeah people just like to use and spanks it and you know you know Congrats to them.

I've been keeping track of the clones that die in the episode title or in the episode descriptions. I will not be keeping track of which episode, which clones jerk off. I've decided I won't do that. That should have been a vote, I think, but okay. I'm sorry. I'm making an executive decision as a producer. We assume a lot of clones jerk off.

Real question is going to be which clones fuck. We'll get answers to some of that. Can't wait. Really? Yeah. I was wondering if there was like a slick ventrous situation going on there. She could do better. Because she does better in this episode.

Sure. So, by the way, shout us to R2, continuing to be the best counterintelligence agent in the Republic. Where he's like, yeah, here's how they're getting the message is out. They're like, oh, shit, okay. We should look into that. but yeah so then yeah once choppers en masse is like somebody's collecting these uh like droid fingers slick is like well that solves that i guess we can all wrap this investigation up ah fucking chopper and chopper's like hey no what doesn't what he actually isn't the thing that he does is he does

the like police union thing he does the like we'll get you a proper investigation we're gonna we're gonna protect you bud don't worry which is which is actually throwing him under the under the bus, but it is doing it in this institutionalized way around, like, you're part of the brotherhood, you know, this is the, the whole line. And Chopper has kept asking, let me circle up with my guys and let them know what's going on. Chopper's always been, like, let us get our story straight. Yeah, yeah, which is interesting. But, yeah, so, like, but Chopper, when he does that, we'll get you a representative when the

when the Jedi get back, will sort of. all this out and everyone's like how did you know the Jedi were gone and that's how he's unmasked the pursuit begins but in the meantime while all this has been happening the scenes have been really intercut

the Jedi have gone right into what they know is an ambush at the separatist headquarters which is basically a cool room with neat lighting they go to a cool hotel and walk right through the front door

Yeah, greeted by the concierge. Yep. And this is where I am certain Obi-Wan and Ventris have slough together. A hundred percent! Are you kidding me? There's no way. Ventris emerges from the shadows, walks past them, Obi-Wan, Ventris, and here I thought this mission was going to be unpleasant. Ventress, the pleasure's all mine.

and as she, and she strips off her robe. And she says, my dear Obi-Wan. Yeah. You cannot leave that out. Y'all are using names. There are pet names involved. They make sure, okay, so they show her take the robe off, and then they let the camera go back up across her body,

and then they show Obi-Wan his eyes going off. Like, the camera was him in that moment. It's great. It's a good show, in my opinion. Yeah, shout out to them. It's wild. Shout out to them for being brave in this children's show. And Anakin just standing there being like, for real.

I mean, I'm married. I'm not going to tell you about that. You can do what you want to do. I'm not going to tell anyone about it. Yeah, y'all do what you all do. Anakin is, it's so funny that Anakin is in any of these scenes because he doesn't have any lines, really? He's not like an actor in any

meaningful way. It's more like he's a chaperone preventing, allowing us as the audience, to understand that what's actually happening here is there was a, there was a DMs exchange. I think Obi-Wan tried to say, listen, I'm at work.

I can't. And she was like, just come through anyway. Bring him. And couldn't, would you just bring him? No. I think, in my It's more that, like, you know, maybe Anakin being there gives us the cover

to imagine what would have happened if only Anakin hadn't been there and couldn't have gotten them in trouble, you know? Sure. I mean, I think Obi-1 and Ventrists like to keep a little distance to keep things hot, you know? Yeah, that's true. That's true. It's the, it's the forbidden.

It's almost like, it's one of those things where it's like, you and your hookup happen to be in the same city at the same time, and you actually know you don't have time to, like, spend a night together. And so, but you are going to, you're going to tell your business partner who you're there with, oh, yeah, I have a friend in town. I'd love to get lunch. You'd love her.

I'd love you. Just come through and, and you're making eyes the whole time. And your friend afterwards is like, I need to go home. I need to go home. Yeah. What did you bring me into? The food wasn't even that good. I don't know.

I left feeling satisfied. Shit. My favorite, my favorite. favorite moment was one of the droids, she like commands one of the droids and the droid is like, yes, mistress. Like, droids simping two.

Everyone is just on the floor for Ventress and I love that for her. This episode needs to be hosed down. Badly. Badly. And also like, now mentally, nobody has a particularly really strong game plan here.

There's a point where she lures the Jedi into the stupidest trap where she's like, come get me, boys. And they're like, sure, that's going to be fine. And she, like, bust the floor out from under them and they, like, plummet through the building. And then they just Jedi leap out of it. And she doesn't really get away. Can I tell you that there is concept art for that moment?

Yeah. I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to the concept art team. And being like, yeah, we really. just need to see those two dudes get fucking owned. Can you just make it look like Ventriss sitting down? Legs crossed just completely owns them because they're doofs. And

she does. I love this image so much. It's so fun. There's also this other piece that has the big weird wall climbing droid in it. That is that I don't understand what its purpose is or how no one saw it hanging on the side of the hotel like building.

They must have come in. I mean, as As soon as the door closed, they must have just fucking dropped in. Well, and she does reveal a massive droid landing force is arriving on planet. In the meantime, Slick got away. They're like, he's going to try to escape. Not really. Instead, he blows the fuck out of the vehicle depot. The weapons depot.

And, yeah. And so they lose all their heavy equipment. basically. And they realize that he thinks like they do. They think like he does. So they use that to set a trap for him and lure him out into the open in the command center. He falls for it. And we get our final confrontation. And yeah. I'm curious about the Weapons Depot thing because I can see how that, okay, so what I imagine is that that was his order, right? Right? Like, your end goal is to destroy the Weapons Depot. Does he agree to destroy the Weapons Depot because he believes that there will be, like, a peaceful transfer?

Like, he's rendering his brother's defenseless, but he's doing this to free his brothers. So I'm just trying to, like, follow that line a little bit and speculate about. In other words, you're saying, you're wondering, does he think by doing this, does he think if I do this, then the battle here will end with a surrender, which will free my brothers or something? I don't think he thinks, I don't think that's what he means when he talks about striking a blow. I think what he means when he says striking a blow is metaphorical or is, it's propagandistic that, like, I'm showing the world of other clones out there. who have these feelings that they can act on these feelings. That they also can, I don't think that he thinks. If the point is to, if the point is to empower and liberate the clones,

you're not going to, why would you take out their, their fucking ammunition? Yeah, that's, he has to know that he's like getting them killed, though, right? Like, the tension of that scene is that droids are coming at that point. Like, they're not going to have any defenses. But I have a hard time. about, when he's saying brothers, I don't think he means the people in my unit. I think he means writ large, this war needs to end with the Republic losing so that this army gets dispersed, which means clones dying on the way there. There is not, I don't think

he's naive enough to think that we can sabotage that without, without clones dying, because he knows that clones are going to, he's already gotten clones killed, right, by betraying them earlier in the episode. Oh, sure, sure, yeah. Like, I don't, I think he's, he's happy. I think he's fine with blood on his hands from people that he thinks are, and this goes back to what Faloni said, are cannon fodder, are people who are throwing themselves into the grinder without developing consciousness and saying, I'm going to oppose this thing. I definitely think this is a break a few eggs to make an omelette situation in his mind. I don't think it's that different from lots of revolutionary actors who know that their violence will hurt innocent people

and people who are potentially, you know, of their, for instance, ethnic backgrounds or from their political backgrounds in some instances. But committing to doing, like, I think if you, if you look at like the ways in which it's often the case that colonized subjects have to fight on both sides of a revolutionary war, generally speaking, in order to, even in the process of that revolution, You know, I'm not saying that, like, it's, that he has purely moral, a moral understanding of the way from here or a good understanding of how to get to his end goal. And he's mostly driven by bitterness and not, like, well-developed ideology. But, but I don't think that he's naive enough to think, and this will get everyone free. Right.

I bet there's a part of him that's even thinking, like, they would die. for a worst cause under the Jedi anyway. Like, they lost 11 people in the previous episode for nothing, so. Right, right, right. To go back to your point of the pairing of episodes, right? Well, like, in the, just the scale of things we're talking about here, like, he might be sacrificing his unit, dozens, hundreds of guys, but, like, there's millions of clones out there.

And so, to a degree, like, this is kind of, like, the... Great Mutiny in India where a lot like colonial rural British colonial rural India was enforced with the help of a lot of Indian troops serving

English masters. The Great Mutiny was a bunch of those dudes turning their guns on the British and any Indians who didn't defect with them. And so like they had to kill a lot of people that they viewed as people who should be their nationalists allies.

And I think that's kind of the math that Slick is looking at here, which is like, yeah, a lot of these clones wouldn't even, these, like, a lot of these loyalist clones, you couldn't even explain to them why this is the right thing to do. And I mean, this is, this is why, like, Slick doesn't have the language for it. He has a feeling that it's totally, and that's why this is so effective. They wrestle him down, and they ask him, you know, how could he do it? I'll give you to his brothers.

And he says, I'm not the traitor. you are you know what you're following orders for what i wanted something out of all this suffering and we've already seen like one of these guys is already either through bloodlust or trauma he's collecting trophies uh he's got it's not for nothing chopper has pretty gnarly burn scars uh over half his half his face like i mean yeah when he describes why he's taking the fingers he it's like full of just of just rancid anger it's like i wanted to take something from them because they've taken from from me so much or whatever which indicates which indicates a sense that is true which is the clones don't get anything for this they have the the thing that they've been told

is you're protecting the republic and that is supposed to be where the fulfillment comes from But the fact that we have Chopper needing to supplement that with droid fingers, there is like, you know, a sort of sublimation happening here of that desire into the droid fingers. He wants validation. He wants something that says, seeing your people die, killing people. This is worth it. Right. And the trophy for the Jedi is – the Jedi also won a trophy, and they get it through political power, through prestige, from me. getting to walk into a room and the tenor changing.

Anyone who is told to do violence for the state is going to want something in return for that. What makes the clones so precious is that there's the Republicans sidestepped that process and just programmed them from birth to not want that thing. And what we're seeing is that that is going to be inefficient. There are going to be people who develop that anyway over time. You know, I think that that's, in some ways, a deeply hopeful thing, right? We might see here someone who is, is, you know, unable to instrumentalize the feeling that he has into something that helps other people here. But what we're first and foremost, what we're seeing is that that feeling can develop.

And that feeling is what's necessary long term for any sort of revolutionary action from any oppressed people, right? is that that, that, they cannot exist in total domination. They can exist in marginalization. They can exist at the bottom of a power relationship. But there has to be that movement for play, that movement for a motion to actually turn into something else. And so even though this is like, you know, obviously he does not get away with this and go off to build a counter revolution. You know, he doesn't go off to build a movement to counter the clones or something like that. I still think it's fundamentally optimistic in the, for people like,

us who want to see the clones not be the boot of the, you know, uh, emerging empire. Well, one could argue that though the Jedi do not know this, clone individuality and self-motivation might also be to their salvation, uh, that the clone as automaton, uh, like created to follow orders and obey, huh, poses a threat, uh, that, like, they haven't reckoned with. Really? Yeah, it would sure be cool if there was something that existed

that made them reckon with the clone of Ultimaton. They're not about to start because I think what's great here is at the end of the scene, the Jedi show back up. And Anakin puts on the disapproving dad

voice and says, Slick, you couldn't be a bigger disappointment. How could you do this to your brothers? And Slick, I love this line. only a Jedi could ask that. And it's such a, like this, the unbridgeable gulf of experience between, like, to Slick, it is so

obvious, because it is a feeling that Slick's lived experience as someone who was not allowed to volunteer, it was just been sent out on this open-ended war to answer these, like, demigods that he is, he's deployed with. And the Jedi are throwing in his face familial obligation, which isn't even real, it's just that they grew them all from vats from the same genetic stock. Like, even the notion of raw family, that is itself an artifice. That's one of the trophies that they're being given, right? That's one of the ways in which they're supposed to be fulfilled is, hey, because you're all brothers here, and that means that if you lose and your brothers is who you love will die too,

so don't lose. He specifically says, and maybe this is actually a good thing to zoom in on a little bit is we do you yeah only a Jedi would ask that it's it's the Jedi who keep my brothers enslaved we do your bidding we serve at your whim i just wanted something more and then he continues after a beat um i love my brothers you're just too blind to see it but i was striking a blow for all clones in that moment he he asked for personal freedom earlier the thing that she offered him was freedom here he is not saying he's freeing the clones what he's saying is i'm striking a blow for them and in that way i i think it's it's clear that he does have his he does have his his, uh, he understands what this is.

This is punching the Jedi and, and the loyalist clones in the nose and, and the republic in the nose. This is a, to strike a blow, I don't think that he has, I don't think that, I think that, I think that he knows better than to have than to think this is part of some grand ambition that's going to lead to an immediate throwover. It is going to give him his personal freedom and it's going to bloody the nose of his, of his captors. Um, and that's, that's something.

It's not nothing, you know. Yeah. And that's why I think it's a cool episode. I'm glad we're finally here. Because an important thing to know, this is episode 16 of season one, but it's also production order episode, season two, episode one. This is the, what is production order? So, yeah, let me try to break it down.

Production codes indicate the order, more or less, the order in which an episode was the production of the episode or maybe the pre-production of the episode begins, which means that this episode starts production after a full season of episodes were produced and the studio said

okay, that's a season. Now, because of the way Clone Wars works and this is true for a lot of shows, all of the season one episodes do not, all of our season one episodes starting with the Clone Wars movie, ending with the

what's the whatever the first Cadbane episode is that Holocon heist? It's a Yoda on the moon Isn't that the first episode?

No the last whatever the last season one episode is Oh I don't know Those are like Those are release order That's the release order episodes But episodes

Produced during season two We'll start to get released earlier than that And in season In season two proper we'll see a mix of episodes that were produced in season one, that were produced during the season two production season, and that were produced even in the season three production season. So it's almost like you're seeing NBA games out of order or something. Do you know what I mean?

Not really, but something like that. That makes sense. I mean, they made enough episodes to fill a season, and then they made some more, and then they shuffled them around. Yeah, basically, yes, including some earlier episodes into a later slot and vice versa. And so I think that's part of why, for instance, you see Christopsis looks good in this episode compared to what it looked like when we were first here, where it was like the most PS1 backdrop skybox shit. Now there are individual buildings that are like spaced apart so that you have some degree of distance and scale communicated. And I think it's also part of why you see them being willing to go down this route with the idea of they're being a clone trader because you'll get more. more of the idea of cloned individuality throughout all of, not all of, but other season

two and forward episodes. And it reminds me that during the episode where one of those, one of those new Godray ones, I don't remember the name of those at this point, Cloak of Darkness, I think is maybe the one that it was, we had Faloni saying that at that point they were not ready to think about a clone being a traitor and I think the idea that they got through the production of a full season of episodes and then took whatever little break they did whether that was real or mental and being like we're drawing a line in the sand this is now season two and having them go you know what the first fucking episode of our season two slate is a clone betrays other clones that's

where we're at we have to go there I think is indicative of a change in the way they're thinking about the setting and the lore and characters. And what I find so funny is you read that quote from Foloni earlier where it sounds like he's kind of judgmental about like, oh man, like must be some kind of bad clone that would do this. But the funny thing is I don't think the writer on this is Drew Z. Greenberg. I think the writing in this episode is pretty clear cut. Like Slick is pretty sympathetic.

Like there isn't there like I don't leave here feeling like, oh something clearly rotten to the core with this guy like is the case he makes for himself is pretty strong and so I think it's one of those things where Falani's like yeah we need a we need a clone gone bad

story and the story that's actually being told is clone gone self-aware of his predicament what's interesting though is that the setting hasn't made that leap yet though right like there's never a point where like oh, why is he

unsatisfied? Why is he frustrated? It's why is he defective? Like, what's wrong there? Right. He's the only one speaking for himself, in other words. Right, yeah. Well, it's just that, like, you know, there's, there's no

sympathy for him internally because the immediate assumption is like, oh, there was something wrong with how he was built, with how he was programmed, instead of being like, oh, we should have given him that time off. last week or whatever you know what I mean or like he's seen a couple

yeah yeah you're right no one ever raises how could we have lost him to what led him to this they just jumped to he was wired wrong is that is that a product of how many clones there are like to the point where which side

like there's just a production margin of error yeah like that's what they break it down because they have so many clones that are all operating on a certain basis that, you know, any, what do they call it again, defective, deficient behavior would be, yeah, exactly what Ali's saying is like a deficiency in the code or whatever. Like, is that a product of just how many clones there are? Like,

you got to chop it off to like I think they think that way but I think the episode is actually pretty clear that all of this is happening because of the subjective experience of these clones the one of the other things that is haunting this episode is PTSD that you have like this is an open-ended guerrilla war basically counterinsurgency that like these guys kind of they get off the transport they fight a bunch of them die they get back on the transport they go somewhere else and do the same thing as the same enemy and so you see one guy coping with it by furiously masturbating

you see another guy coping with it by collecting trophies and really like working on a hate for the droids that he doesn't just want to like defeat them as enemies he wants to like take their fucking fingers and Slick

just wants out of this war if Slick could just walk and they're like you can just demobilize he would do that too But the thing is, like, the Republic is also in this corner where they just need these clones. They need a steady, never-ending supply of clones to continue fighting this war. So the thing they can't allow is clones to be medically discharged from this conflict. They can't sectionate clones.

They can't send clones to clone therapy for processing their experiences. These guys just need to stay on the line. long as they possibly can. Yeah. And it's leading to increasing strain. And, like, that inherent nobility that they ascribe to the clones of, like, they serve the Republic, they serve the Jedi, they stand by their brothers in arms and their literal brothers.

Here we see, like, versions of it being kind of tainted by someone who's starting to become, like, there's actual bloodlust and hatred now in the way he fights his war. And here we see Slick is someone who has completely lost faith in the cause and is willing to sell out anyone to get his ticket out. Yeah. It almost reads to me as if it's more expensive to take care of one clone than it is to just replace them with like a different clone. I don't know. So, you know, like Cash 22, right, is like how they keep extending the number of missions. pilots have to fly before they can go home.

That literally happened, like 25 missions at the start of the War II, and they would rotate you home, you'd be done flying combat missions above Germany. By the end of the war, it was like 50 missions, and the survival rates didn't appreciably change. It was just more effective to keep those air crews flying 50 missions rather than let them do their 25 and go home. Because too many guys got to 25.

So they just kept extending it out. 30 missions. 40. And by the end, they're like, the war's almost over. We're just never sending these guys home until it's done. And so, like, I mean, this is part of my family's lore. Like, I'm named for a guy Robert Brassel. He was my great uncle.

He died in April, 1945, Mission 48. And, like, so it's real horrible. Like, my grandmother, I think, got the telegram after VE Day. Wow. But, like, I remember reading his letters, and he knew. Like, he was like, huh, it's funny. Like, that guy from, he's from Tinley Park in Chicago. He'd gotten a letter about one of the other guys that had gone to the Air Corps a little bit before him.

He'd come home from World War II after his 25 missions. And Robert wrote back to my grandmother, you know, it's funny that he's home because, you know, when I do 25 missions, I'll only be halfway done. And, of course, he didn't get done. But the logic there was training is expensive, veterans are hard to come by. It's just better if these guys stay and see this through to the end. And that logic has governed a lot of conflicts. being used in a war against a rising fascist empire in Europe, which had to be put down unquestionably. The story that is being told here is that this is happening for absolute

bullshit reasons that are grounded in the failure of liberal democracy to prevent itself from being corrupted and controlled by forces that pursue that that kind of absolute rotting of the kind of political body well and remember too this is coming right yes early in the um iraq conflict there were the stop loss orders where guys weren't allowed to muster out uh even though there are terms of enlistment had completed uh because again like training people up to fight was hard there weren't enough soldiers so sorry we're just not going to let you go um And, yeah, the Republic is kind of there as a metaphor for this, where it's like, yeah, we love the troops. The troops are noble.

The troops are good. The troops can't leave. And so that brings us to Slick and it brings us to Chopper and it brings us to Jester. Jack the masterbating one. And the one who jacks off. Yeah, Jester. You're real funny, aren't you, Jester? Jester, the masturbating clone group.

We're just furiously masturbating his way through. He got so owned in his naming ceremony. Jesus Christ. Yeah, you're a fucking joke. Your jester, you fucking jacking off all the time. Do you think that he's called jester because there's a jester inside of a jack in the box? No?

It's more of a clown, I guess. Yeah, he just pops out. I would call it a jester. A clown is not the same as a jester. A jester. has the hat. You're right. And a jack-in-a-box toy has the hat.

Yes. Clowns have hats. No, but the... But not like a jester's... What is that called? I just feel like one of them is a sub-category of the other, right? Like, a jester is like a... Gestors are a type of clown.

Yeah. Yeah, I agree with that. But justers do more than just... Yeah. Justers... Yes, you're right, Natalie. Justers point out uncomfortable truths to the people around. Now, admittedly, Jester did not achieve that standard in this episode.

Jester did not explain how his furious, compulsive masturbation was, in fact, a commentary on the plight of the clone trooper. But I think we could read that. We felt it. It got through to us on a more civilized age, a clone was podcast. We heard his call. dead ass for masturbation on this one didn't think it would happen could have never guessed we would have gotten here look the uh i don't know after that ventress scene uh where she takes off her cloak like some people watch the show and learned like somewhere online started to learn what masturbation

was after watching this they take special care to to on that pan down as the cloak calls They took special care. And I appreciate them for it. At some point, I was trying to Google about, like, the history of interest and stuff. I don't have the post anymore, but I did find one at some point that was from such a different kind of sexual culture age. Because I think it was from, it must have been from when the Tartikovsky Kohn Wars was going up. because I think it was from like the mid-2000s, like early mid-2000s, like during the, I sort of had been early 2000s then, before Revenge of the Sith came out or around that time.

And it was people talking about how they didn't understand why Venturous wasn't hot. Why didn't they make a hot Dark Jedi lady? Oh, you fucking. Yeah, Rob, the face you're making is face I made wise scrolling through this form post from 2002. and people saying that Ventress wasn't hot. Everyone now understands. I'm sorry she would look like Admiral Dala, you Normie fuck. She's a boob window.

She has a boob window. She's a bald batty. Baldness was in a different place, maybe for the audience for Star Wars in 2002. I think what we've seen is that Clone Wars has democratized Star Wars fandom. There were no original trilogy hot bald women. The Twylex are out there. are out there holding it down for bald baddies everywhere I think the thing is the Twilight like Braintail itself describes

long long tresses so I think it kind of gets murky just in terms of people's head like they're not haired tresses they're bald no they're decorated right they're braided I guess an ora Singh Ora Singh is the oh she's not bald she actually has hair too doesn't she she says hair she's like bald and then has like a huge ponytails or a sing i'm gonna send pictures of or a sing thank you you'll understand what i'm talking about at some point i need to talk to you about how much i hate admiral dala as a character we'll get there we'll get to that we'll find

an opportunity i don't think i know them no reason you should uh she appears in like third like seat here um old expanded universe fiction we'll talk about it some other day uh so yeah that's the hidden enemy and the hidden enemy in this case is maybe a clone or maybe it's the entire framework that the republic has sort of thoughtlessly adopted for fighting his war and holding on to his position but I think this is to me this is an episode that like again feels like thematically is firing on all cylinders

even if the execution is a little rocking in places any final thoughts on this from y'all I decided I like it So to talk through it sometimes I was just Okay so When Okay so in my notes

I wrote This episode sucks Only cool part so far Was when a clone Decapitated a droid to get information So that was on my first watch The thing about my first watch Was

It was last night I appreciate this It was late And You know I'd had a long day of work and I was able to watch the trespasser earlier in the day, but I was like, I want to get this done day before. I don't want to do it today, or day of recording. So I was like, yeah, I'll just boot this up. But at the same time, I hadn't done my Praetorium run of the day. Now, Praetorium is a

dungeon in the MMO Final Fantasy 14 online, which right now is free. through Heaven's Ward. You can download it for free. And the thing about Praetorium is it really ties a bow on the end of Arum Reborn, which is the first expansion of Final Fantasy 14. And the other thing about Praetorium is that it has, because it's this, you know, big moment at the end of the first expansion of Final Fantasy 14, It tells a story, and that story cannot be skipped.

And for new players that were coming into Final Fantasy 14 late, veterans were skipping through cutscenes and completing the entire dungeon before new players could even finish one cutscene. So what they did was they made it so that you cannot skip cutscenes. So this is about an hour-long dungeon. It's fucking so long. Wait, that's not the twist I was expecting. Um, there is about, there's about, there's about,

you've run this, right? There's about 45 minutes worth of cutscenes, straight movie time. So I, yes, Alice, sorry, just to give you context, imagine, imagine playing a game for like 40 or so hours, and then you do a dungeon, and then you watch 30 minutes of a video that is, here's the plot to the game that you just played. You have to do that. Yeah, because if nothing happened, really. Yes, say that again?

This is unskippable. So every time somebody queues into this dungeon. And it's during the mission. It's not you hit play and it's seven minutes. Then you have to do three minutes of content. Then another five minutes of video. And then you have a boss fight. Yeah.

Then you have a boss fight. And then, yeah. And then two minutes of video. And then you're running through Praetorium. Then you get into a mech. It's a lot. Yeah, you get into a mech. So don't make, don't let that make you think it's good.

So people want to. incentivize players to do this dungeon, to accompany the nobs through, you know, this 45-minute hellscape. And what they do is they add extra XP, extra tomes. Tomes are things you can trade for, like, clothes, like better gear and shit like that. Right now in Final Fantasy 14, which is free up through Heaven's Word. Operators, Dan, and Bob. do you get a fucking

do you get tombstones for this I spent so much money to play up to heaven's word and then they did that I'm so sorry they can refund you so Natalie is apologizing now on behalf of Final Fantasy 14

this is not this is not the values of our community yeah and this yeah it really isn't representative of the Final Fantasy 14 community but feels like it's pretty representative that kind of Funnesty 14 14

though, if I'm being quite honest. Debatable. I'm willing to take up that argument. Feeling maybe your value wasn't totally returned me, you. I've gotten my values. I have like 700 hours in that game. I've gotten my fucking $60 or whatever.

Don't know that what you're looking for from that game is what everyone else might be looking for from that game. That's fair. You know what? That's fair. I go to a rave every Saturday night in that game. So, you know, I'm doing different things.

You've got to come to the rave. So. So. There's this ongoing event right now where you can get special tomes called Mughal Tomes. And the Mughal Tomes, you can trade in for special things, like cool mounts that you can ride around. Where this is going? I know where this is going, and it's so good. So I need to run Praetorium at least once a day because I need to get enough Mughal Tomes to get all the cool mounts that are being offered.

And this event ends soon. What amounts do? What amounts do? You ride them and they look cool. Okay. But only in special. So if you have a mountain now, why do you need another? Wait, yeah, how many people,

how many people can be on the mount that you want? Because I know that that's a thing. Only one. That's true. What? You're not even saving up for a party bus? There's no party bus being offered. You know, sometimes they offer the party bus, no party bus on the ticket right now, okay?

I don't, just talk to Yosh. What's the mount you're trying to get? I've already gotten them all, but I'm still going, because at this point... Why are you still running it every day? Because at this point, there's lesser mounts that you can get, and there's also, like, cute minions, which are, like, little pets that follow you around, and, you know, I have... I'm not afraid to say... I have a compulsion to run this thing every day, and a part of the reason why I'm able to do this is because

of the following. So I load into Pretorium. Oh, here's the thing. Usually, when people run Praetorium that have already run it a lot, they do this thing called watching something else while doing Praetorium. So I was like, oh, this is a perfect opportunity. I can do my Praetorium run. While I watch this episode, I can take notes during the cutscenes.

It's going to be great. So I load into Pretorium. I have Disney Plus on one monitor and Praetoriums on my main screen. and I settle in, cutscene starts, and I'm like, oh my God, I am sober right now. The thing about Praetorium, for me, is that I need to be blasted in order to get through this dungeon every night. So I personally, I'm fucking gone off that loud in Praetorium every night. And the thing is, it's amazing, because Yoshi-P has invented time travel. All you have to do is load into Praetorium, smoke a fat doink, and 45 minutes.

I can't believe you've done your plug like this to say that that's Yoshi-P's invention. It's really my invention. But Yoshi-P helped out a little bit. You know, he made the dungeon. Natalie, the adventure getting really high and playing an M-MO compulsively night after night. experience heretofore unknown to humanity it's amazing you can only you can only time travel forward but you can time travel it's incredible so you know here i am i take the thing is i bought this fucked up vape and um this vape is i'll show it to you right now it's right here can i get a while

this happens to be on the podcast i missed it oh sure i have to get yeah thanks for putting your your hand in front of it like it was a makeup so this is a charger can you hold it up again so i can yeah uh-huh i just got to get a screenshot for the show notes save that there okay thank you so this this is a charger actually wait one more time i'm going to make it bigger i need one more one more full screen let's get this uh that way it's uh yep uh wait let me get the lighting right yeah that would be great i've lost you okay could you maybe like do the um um shopping network thing where you're kind of offering it and like presenting it thing where it's like ah yeah there we go like that but then we're not going to okay yeah but we need the

I need the behind for focus you're about this okay now it looks like I'm like throwing up a fire you're coming howing yeah okay we'll go okay what's up with this vape okay so this vape is really cool I bought it because a friend of mine young slob on Twitter I'm recommending it. Shout out to Young Slav. We love that guy. And it has, the cool thing is I got a bundle when I got it. And the bundle came with a charging station that I just keep on my desk at all times because I love having little gadgets on my desk, you know? Sure. The thing is, I load into Praetorium, you know, I'm settled in, and I just reach for that vape and I take a fat hit and I throw out. You know, huge clouds. Huge clouds. Huge clouds are coming out.

The cotton is unbelievable. It's wild. It's smoking in here. I'm hotbox in my studio. And like it, I settle into the high. And I'm like getting cozy fucking Nero van, whatever the fuck is talking in my ear about, you know, the end of the world or the garlet empire. Rob, not the, not. Nero is a character in Final Fantasy 4th.

There was a character in Final Fantasy 14 named Nero. Not the historical Nero. No, yeah. It ain't that loud. It ain't that loud. We've already established you can only travel forward. Yeah, you can only go forward. So I'm settling in, you know, and I look to my right at my other monitor, and I just see the most disappointed-looking Disney Plus.

Windows browser staring back at me like what the fuck have you done you were saying Anakin would never Anakin would never get high before admission Obi-1 has called me

a deficient this is deficient behavior I'm getting so I started I was like fuck it you know I'll watch the first run I watch the first watch high I'll watch it again tomorrow

it's going to be fine and for the first like five minutes of the episode I was like this shit's weak like nothing's happening I was like whatever then the droid got his head pulled off and I was back in I was like okay

that did something for me so that's why I think that I might have not liked the episode as much as you did when you first watched it but now wait wait wait wait we don't know if Rob was not also extremely high while watching this episode

I was not I might have been a tiny at the record show Allie probably was a little bit. Thank you. I feel less alone. There was a gap there, so I might have sobered up in the meantime, but I like... You were not running for Torium.

Oh, I was not. No, no, no. I was only watching Star Wars. I turned my phone on Do Not Disturb. Wow. Well, I think that'll do it for this episode of a more civilized age. Be sure to rate and review us on your podcast platform choice. I like to think we're a five-star podcast.

I certainly thought so, uh, coming into this episode. Anyway, you can learn about supporting a more civilized age at patreon.com slash civilized. Which we are. I want to remind you to check us out on Patreon slash civilized. Do set us questions for our upcoming Q&A.

There is a bit of debate as to what we're going to cover this month. Because Austin has been troubled to learn. I think lately there have been a lot of troubling things. that emerged in the process recording the show. Do you have a problem with

my fucking way of spending my evenings? You need to understand that Natalie was not doing that Natalie was not

just doing that for herself. She was striking a blow for all clones. For Warriors of Light everywhere. For Warriors

Light everywhere who have to run the Praetorium even after they've gotten the mouth they want. I think Um, I think this is a good plug for our Patreon because something happened on the most recent Patreon episode. And we all thought to ourselves, we might have to watch Revenge of the Sith.

I got a... There was a revelation. I could... I raised a thing. Conversation. Yeah. Like the way you would any of the... Do you know how Natalie just did a lot of really good work setting up what Final Fantasy 14 is, what the Praetorium?

showed us the prop of If this were a Final Fantasy 14 podcast That would have been tremendous Incredible content I would have done that For Order 66 If I had realized that I was the only one on the podcast Who knew what Order 66 was

And I didn't I just said You know how I go like Oh this is an Arizona iced tea And I just you all know what an Arizona iced tea And I just you all know what an Arizona ice tea he is 99 cents it's on the can though uh we're all just aligned on that instantly uh that's how i talked about order 66 and i was met with silence i said well i think what would happen is he would

say execute order 66 and they got nothing we got no nothing just dead air because no one on this podcast actually knows anything about revenge of the Sith is what I've learned I get a DM today somebody was like you really didn't know what order 66 was shout out to ren Shout out Sarenne, friend of the sight Holding it down, number one in my heart Hang on, Austin, I can't stand the slander I know roughly what our 60s is Thanks to the supercut of Force Unleased cutscenes

That I have watched a few times And which might stand as one of the better Star Wars movies ever made covering the interbellum periods Between the Clone Wars and the Rebellion Really a lot of words for saying We're all just trying to say how we didn't do our homework to the teacher. Yes.

But you're trying to make it sound like you did all this other stuff. But that's the work work. Yeah, I took another class on ancient history. I knew that it happened. I just didn't know the details. You thought it was a thing droids did. I did not know that clones were involved at all whatsoever. I thought Anakin killed everyone.

I thought Anakin killed all the Jedi's. I thought that's what Lord of 66. I, the thing is, the thing is, I, it's not that I'm a teacher and I'm disappointed, it's that, you know, like slick, I am your brother in arms in this. And it feels like I was betrayed. It feels like I'm the only one who sees the truth for what it is. And, and I would like to remedy that before we get closer in or deeper in. I think it was a beautiful dream. The dream that three of us had a working understanding of Revenge of the Sith and Rob didn't was a beautiful vision of the world that we could. have had. I never agreed to that. I told you that I didn't know shit about that movie. I think we saw it together. I also think we saw it together, Allie.

Was that loud? I also was pretty sure Natalie said she'd seen that movie. I've seen it. I've seen it. Seconds ago, you said you didn't see it. But I didn't really see it. You're playing Final Fantasy 14. I was like I was like I was like

Fnaw reveals an Anakin Skywalker shaped vape this is what you brought to the Okay but Wren okay Wren has a vape that Same same same babe but it looks like a Sith lightsaber I swear to God it's It's insane it's amazing Shout out to Wren The thing is I've seen it

Like 15 years ago when I didn't have consciousness and standing Right we're gonna watch it We have longevity of memory To really I am going to let me

I don't have it I'm not I'm not Austin I'm letting go my dream Okay thank you But let me just Let me just bury it here So I've been very pleased

With the principal stand I'd taken That Clone Wars Was such trash the, or attack of the clones was such trash that I didn't need to know where that trilogy was going. It couldn't really add much to it. It only became interesting to

me in the context of how it was going to pay off the sense of fate that hangs over the Clone Wars. And so I have been watching the Clone Wars with great suspense because I was never certain how they

would handle the fact these are real relationships that we care about with some modicum of free will, but hanging over all of it is the fact that we do know that Order 66 is going to come down, and the clones are going to, without a second thought, or maybe not, gun down most of the Jedi. That's the question. In sort of a, in a great purge. Wait, so you knew that it was clones?

Rob is the, I almost said this story. Rob somehow is the one who knew the most of the three of you. Well That seems he took the other class The force unleashed If many cutscenes were Right uh huh But

And so I was really like keen To see like To me it was very tragic If for instance Like does Rex Like try to fragg Obi-Wan or Anakin That would suck

I would feel terrible Do they realize Like what they've done On some level do the clones want to kill these fuckers? And that's why I find characters like Slick so interesting because like I could see like when I watched this I was like

man it's going to be really good when we get to Revenge of the Sith because we're going to see like they're laying groundwork for maybe some of these clones like on some level comprehended exactly what they were doing and we're like fuck yeah it's our time now I'm not going to have that journey. We can make this decision right now

if you don't want to watch Revenge of the Sith we don't have to. I just feel like maybe this moment. If we were going to do it, this is the moment. This is the moment. I think it's hard. I think I think we made what was already a controversial decision, not to watch the Revenge of the Sith after watching the other two prequel films. We defended that on a certain ground. That ground has fallen out from under us. The listeners are the ones with the higher ground now. I mean, the revelation is something that is revealed. But what else might we not know? What else might we not know? Should we put it to a poll? Should we put it to a poll? You don't, okay, do you know what happens to General Grievous? Nope, zero clue. Do you know what happens to Count Duku? Nope, zero clue.

These are the things we should know. We should know these because in many cases, they are being referenced in the Clone Wars. Didn't know Grievous was in it. Didn't know because you've mentioned it. But I don't know from my previous knowledge. Yeah, yeah. Don't know what happens to Count Duku. Don't know what happens to, I mean, Yoda, you can probably guess because of Dagaba.

who he ends up going to Dagaba. The planet and Empire's best back. He can't do this to me. Please. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You don't, the thing everyone listening to the podcast has to understand is anything you hear once, I hear three times. Because I hear it when it happens, then I hear it twice while I'm editing, at least minimum. Uh-huh.

That's okay. And for that, I want to say, Allie, apologies. I know you're the producer at Friends at the table. You have to hear everything I say like eight times. Yeah, well, I'll do it. Shout out Ticado, who's also suffered many times. The thing is, I know what Dagabah is. I just don't know everything by name, okay?

You got to give me a little byline to each of those. We couldn't, I couldn't not joke about it given the context. Understandable. In this particular context. Completely understand. I give you that. I think we should do it. We should do it next episode.

The thing is, we thought about, we thought about, I, I, the end of season one would be a really good place to be like, oh, we finish the season now we're going to do it. But season one ends in the weirdest fucking way because of the set of episodes they put back to back to back. That makes it weird to cut between. So, let's do it. Desperato heist guy doesn't lead to an actual segue into the clone one. Whereas this pair of episodes feels like it really does in some ways. Well, I don't know. But I trust you think it does.

Rob, I'm sorry. Rob are you? You know what? It was a good dream. I think it's healthy, honestly, because here's the thing. I don't need to be holding on to the spite from a midnight showing like 20 years ago at this point. I didn't let that go. And this is good. There's like six more seasons to go where you're maybe going to want that context.

We're going to be doing the show for a long time. That's the real thing. If this was like a three-season show, I would be like, let's wait. But there are so many fucking more episodes of this. And I don't imagine how it'll enrich my viewing of the next time I watch The Force Unleashed, super cut, all cut scenes. Oh, that was a reference to that time when Duku did this. The Force Unleashed does rule, by the way.

I just want to say that out loud. What is the Force Unleashed? It's a PlayStation 3 game. you play as Galen Star Killer who is someone who works he's like Natalie

So Darth Vader has a dark apprentice who's also a sexy bad boy Yeah you would fucking love this dude Really bad or is he kind of a good kid at heart He sent on all sorts of missions But one day he runs into a Jedi Who escaped Order 66 And that Jedi is like

I see what's in your heart boy I see what's in your future I'm in contact with the force and what I see in your future is me. And he realizes at that moment he's going to end up mentoring this kid and the kid throws him down a fucking bottomless pit. But it sits with that kid for ages and he's like uncomfortable with like what he does

and like Vader keeps sending him out on these assassination missions. And his only friend in the world is this assassin droid who trains him sort of like Inspector Clousseau's assistant who's always trying to kill him. His assassin droid always tries to set him up with little combat drills and surprises him. but also he's his only friend in the world and his droid also inhabits other characters so when Vader like communicates with him

the droid takes on Vader's persona and mannerisms and they're both like kind of traumatized by the experience of like living with Vader and all his various issues and then he gets a new pilot for his assassinship who's a sexy imperial pilot lady who has a non-regulation uniform I think you can use your imagination for that one video games so he tracks down that Jedi

And the Jedi, like, the Jedi's like, hey, you've got to get out of this life. You're actually, you're actually a good kid. And I know who your parents were. And you've been basically kidnapped by Vader. And he's like, holy shit. And so he starts learning. But here's the other thing. He starts, like, plotting with the, he meets Beil Organa.

He meets Ma'amama. He meets Leo Organa. And they start, like, laying the groundwork for the rebellion. And he's like, all right on the spring on Vader and Palpatine. We're going to bring the empire down right now. but oh it was all as palpatine foresaw the punchline of the force unleashed is that palpatine having vanquished all the Jedi and all enemies had to smoke out his last enemy so he created a rebellion that people who were disloyal to him would flock to so that he could destroy them and at the end of the game he realizes oh fuck there's a rebellion going star killer's dead he kills the kid the kid doesn't make it it's really heartbreaking He might come back Natalie, hold your fire

There's a force unleashed too Yeah There's kind of a No, it's not as good There's kind of a I don't know Like Avengers endgame situation Happening here

We're like he There's, you know There's ways and there's ways Yeah But at the end Palpatine is like We better do something about this This rebellion

Or it could be the end of us. And it's ironic, of course, because this was his master plan, was to smoke out his enemies, and he ends up, like, touching off the rebellion that's going to kill him. It's tremendous. And this is the sort of irony, dramatic irony, that becomes available to you when you have all of the source material in front of you. We didn't say that was important thing about the Force of Leach, by the way, Natalie, I want you to know this, is that each of those missions that you go on, you go to a different planet, and you get a different cool jacket to wear. Oh my god, I love that.

I think it's also another very important thing, which is he holds his lightsaber like backwards and it's sick. It's so cool. I guess a Soka does that too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He does the underhanded gripper. It's like back behind him like this, like a ninja. That's so sexy. It's extremely sexy. Oh, he's like all just like

raw power and rage use of the force. Like, famously there's the he throws a fucking Star Destroyer out of orbit scene in this game. It does happen. The force is unleashed. Natalie. And for the very first mission, you get to play as Darth Vader.

Right. I kill a lot of wookies. We should play this. There's an achievement where you get, sorry. There's an achievement where if you kill a thousand wookies, I think, in that first. A thousand? They keep coming towards you. And the way that I did this because I cared back then about achievements.

You can stand on one bridge. It's where the wookies live. So, you know, it's like... It's their home, yeah. So you can stand on one, like, rope bridge, and then a bunch of wookies are coming towards you and the other one, you can just keep forced to put it out. Now, that's a video game, logic.

What is the achievement called? Do you know? I don't know. I wish I remembered. Jesus Christ. Is this a Muso game? Right, exactly. It is when you're Darth Vader.

They're like establishing Darth Vader's power, which is why it was important to achieve. I'm glad you got the achievement. Thank you. Anyway. I'm sure you got a cool jacket from that one too. So. I wonder what it's made of.

All right. So I guess the next episode We're going to be doing Revenge of the Seff And bringing this energy with us Oh yeah We're gonna be punchy I'm gonna I'm gonna go full I'm gonna unleash my force on that

On that podcast Just you wait Is that a weed thing also? No Is that the thing we have to watch it now But we have to watch it high We can't say that We can't have that be a podcast thing

I can't watch it on it might not be it might be yeah it might be good well we'll see it could be good I feel like it's a it could be like a more drunk scenario okay what if we move the other way which is we would just watch it this time but then we do some sort of special watch between season six and seven yeah we revisit it with all that context maybe we watch it together between six and seven and we do like the MSC 3K talk over it recording for people do you know what i mean yes i love that and that one will be that will be it will be years from now we will have our vaccines more civilized after dark

more civilized after dark onlyfans dot com slash civilized no fucking way all right well i think on that note we hope you'll join us all again on a podcast not on Onlyfans for another return to a more civilized age but until then remember that none of this is as long ago or as far away as it seems

Yeah especially not when you time travel Only goes one way It goes one way I don't know. I don't know. We're going to be. I don't know what I'm going to be.